


Maroon

by orphan_account



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, M/M, Post-Break Up, and language i guess, crude descriptions of melted chocolate, no happy ending, rated M for incest, that's it that's all you get
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-10
Updated: 2019-10-10
Packaged: 2020-12-07 10:28:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,366
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20974388
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: David probably won’t answer you over that.He tries not to look at you at all, really.





	Maroon

It’s quiet.

With David, it’s always quiet.

At least, around you it is. Silence tends to weigh down the atmosphere when he’s in your presence more than it does with the others. You took note of this the second week of your reunion, when Rose or Rox’ could easily get him to open up to the point they had to urge him to shut up about pointless, mundane shit like what time PBS stops playing Sesame Street so he can safely surf the hotel television box without accidentally popping a chubby to Elmo’s apparently titty-equivalent, perfectly symmetrical eyeballs. Which of course _could_ bring up much more interesting questions in regards to the non-degrading social decency he’s somehow managed to delegate into his pinky toe for emergency usage in company of people who don’t already know he’s a fucking living, breathing, unintentionally professional troll who wears his swim trunks inside out on purpose for irony. But David probably won’t answer you over that.

He tries not to look at you at all, really.

You suppose it’s for good reason. It’s sort of your fault. Probably. You don’t actually like to think about it, so you’ll stop that train of thought right there. You give him his space, like he wants; all verbal attempts at communication kept inside the figurative monologuing vehicle at all times. And hands. Especially hands.

The downside to David’s disregard towards you was how obvious the tension had been. As Roxy so helpfully pointed out, the air between you two was “So thick it feels like the fumes are tryin’ to get me throat pregertant.” A colorful description that you could have gone the rest of your life without hearing come out of her mouth, but okay.

“You’ll go out together after lunch.” A _great_ suggestion by Rose. You couldn’t have been anymore uncomfortable with the idea.

“_You’ll,_ as in me and David. Alone. Without you two.” It was your best defense against her, but Rose was an adamantium fortress with an interminable smugness by the likes of a very hefty cat standing next to a mound of shredded tissue paper clearly accumulated after an eventful evening of fucking up literally everything in your agenda labeled _staying as far the hell away from David at all costs by any means necessary._

They didn’t give you or David much of a chance to object.

And of course it’s awkward as all levels of Hell when it’s just you and your estranged brother out on the hottest day of the year trying to communicate your discomfort without actually talking to each other. One, because you're so drenched in sweat all of the fluids have most likely definitely left your body, leaving your tongue feeling swollen in your mouth. And two, David’s still giving you the cold shoulder and you seriously wish that shit was legitimately icy so you could bury your face into his skin in a totally not weird and some percentage platonic way just to cool the fuck off by some meagre amount of degrees.

“I’m going somewhere indoors. If I have to spend another fucking minute out here in this heat death some idiot is going to find my advanced decomposing corpse lying in the gutter and then every tabloid within forty states will write about how David Strider was found lying dead in his own molten hot feces on Houston’s sidewalk,” David complains, which does a decent job at catching you off guard because it's the most he's said to you since the moment his plane landed in Texas.

“S’fine with me.” You shrug and just… follow him with muted desperation, because you don't want this to feel as strained as your fists do in your pockets, and David is extending a very dilapidated, sort of battered olive branch towards you. Which you're not going to turn down for every greedy, horrible reason your body can intangibly manifest.

David decides to take a detour down fucking bakery street and lead you into a chocolate shop, with the excuse that “It's gotta be AC’d to keep all the confectionaries from melting, right? Oh God, did you feel that? Straight up opened the door right into Elsa's winter wonderland, get me Pee-Wee Herman on the phone for his next Holiday special.”

“It's not _that_ cold,” you comment flatly, trailing after David as he makes his way towards the counter to greet the cashier. “At least it's out of the sun, I guess.”

“It’s nice in here,” is what David chooses to respond with, like he's defending his stance, typical monotone inflection to accompany. You don't know what that implies. “Anyway what do you want,” he adds, Tokyo fucking Drifting expertly away from confrontation station. Or something else.

Maybe you're reading too much into that. Maybe he's trying not to give you an inch. “Don't care. It all tastes the same to me.” 

David “hm”'s at your lackluster participation in his bogusly demonstrated enthusiasm, then turns away, which you know by now is code for Grab Us A Table. _Which_ shouldn't make your stomach ache, but it does. 

You're so far from having anything that even closely resembles an appetite.

A corner booth catches your eye once you go scavenger hunting for private seating (a habit you should probably break but instead have chosen to endlessly procrastinate on). Once you're settled into a seat you fish your phone from your pocket to distract your thoughts with apps you don't have a large enough attention span to play. Nothing interests you right now, and it's a nagging, irritating whim on the ass end of your emotions that urges you to look up too swiftly when David arrives at the table minutes later with two plates in his hands.

He sets them down.

“Their fridge broke so we're just gonna have to deal with staring at these hideously disfigured portmanteaus of flaccid milk chocolate dicksicles,” he states, gesturing to the plates with in fact a single long, limp looking bar of chocolate on each one. Drizzled in melted caramel and nut crumbles that’ve sunken into the desserts. Tiny spoons are tucked underneath them for easier, cleaner consumption. “I’m definitely not gonna be the chump to try it first, just putting that out there now.”

Of course. You sigh and grab a spoon after he's taken his spot across from you, dipping it into the soft, nearly melted chocolate. It drips down the edges of your silverware, completely unappetizing. Somehow you can't help but think this day has been one spectacularly shitty event after the other. You weren't even hungry in the first place, but it's too hot to just storm outside - plus David brought you to this stupid looking chococafé and you don't want to leave about as much as it hurts you to even be here. It's pathetic.

You look at your heaping scoop of lumpy shit-jizz and frown, keeping as much disdain off of your face as you can despite it all. 

Before you can even raise it to eye level, however, David speaks up, so loud and abrupt it makes you flinch. 

“I'm sorry,” he says, staring at you dead on with an unreadable expression. It gets you to lift your brow, but he doesn't let you interject, speaking faster now. “This was actually a really fucking dumb idea, wasn't it? What was I even _thinking,_ dragging you here. Ha. How fucking romantic, right?” He's starting to get up, to shuffle out of the booth, so you drop your spoon after a moment of delayed shock and mimic his movements as quickly as you can.

“Dave-”

“What is this, a fucking _date?_ Spare me the humiliation,” he interrupts, already out of his seat and heading towards the door faster than you can register the words as they sink painstakingly slow into your guts.

And then you pause. Hesitate. _Whatever_ it is that you do as you watch him leave. 

Instead of following David, you elect to allow gravity to take your ass and sit it back down, head finding itself in your palms as you rest your elbows on the table.

You can't go. You can't.

And just like that, it's quiet again.


End file.
